Beyond Lawyering

Baum Hedlund obtained a school bus and conducted a post-crash fire test that indicated that the school bus involved in the 1988 Carrolton, Kentucky bus crash was consumed in 60 seconds after the fire erupted from the gas tank under the stepwell. Twenty-seven people died in that crash, mostl children. The bus, above, was used in a crash test video conducted by the defendants.

Safety concerns are very much a part of the firm’s activities and efforts have been made by the firm’s attorneys to go far beyond the case resolution in bus accidents.

Sometimes our quest for justice has continued long after a successful resolution of the lawsuit, in an attempt to prevent similar harm to others. Our attorneys have spearheaded, and participated in, campaigns that have led to safety improvements, several involving commercial transportation.

In an effort to improve bus safety, after the resolution of a Kentucky bus crash, Baum Hedlund  created information packets, including a crash test video that reenacted the actual crash, and organized and funded a national campaign in all fifty states and Canada. The package urged school bus owners, operators and purchasers to relocate gas tanks positioned next to the front doors to an unexposed position inside the frame behind the rear axle, thus reducing the chance of a fire and permitting exiting the front doors if a fire erupts.

Our proactive attorneys have also:

  • Testified at a special State Senate Transportation Committee Hearing which was probing events leading up to a fatal truck accident which killed our clients' son. A California state senator invited our firm to testify at the hearing regarding a permit issued by Caltrans to the truck company, to carry a load two inches higher than the overpasses under which it was traveling. The large tank it was carrying was ripped from the truck by the overpass and crushed the car behind the truck, killing our clients' son.

  • Testified before state legislators in a train crash investigation in order to improve train safety

  • Testified before a state seismic safety commission in order to improve earthquake proofing for building facades

  • Testified before the U.S. FDA on two different occasions in order to get proper safety labels on certain drugs

  • Testified before a foreign government to warn them of contaminated blood products being used in their country by hemophiliacs

  • Met with members of the United States House and Senate regarding the risk of suicide in antidepressant drugs

  • Assisted Congressional Investigators from two separate Committee investigations which resulted in two Congressional hearings at which pharmaceutical executives and FDA officials were interrogated and chastised for failing to protect the public health

  • Helped obtain U.S. legislation to provide humanitarian aid to thousands of families affected by HIV‑contaminated hemophilia medication

  • Helped in a recall campaign of defective drain covers in spas and hot tubs so long‑haired people would not drown by being caught in them

  • Helped obtain equitable treatment for families of victims of airline crashes occurring in the deep ocean by advancing the amendment of the outdated 80‑year‑old federal "Death on the High Seas Act" which used to drastically limit the amount of recovery in similar crashes.